Definitions of Holistic Management and Low-Stress Livestock Handling

Ben Bartlett practices low-stress animal handling with some reindeer at LARS in Fairbanks. He’s using a water bottle on a stick to appear as large as the reindeer and with their antlers.

Ben Bartlett is a retired Michigan State University extension agent. He and his wife, Denise, raise sheep and stocker cattle on their 900 acre farm on Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. In this video you see him on one of his visits to Alaska where he shares great definitions of Holistic Management and Low-stress Livestock Handling and why they are especially important the more challenging your environment becomes. Plus you’ll see a different version of livestock, with reindeer roaming in the background and Ben interacting with one of the musk oxen at the Large Animal Research Station in Fairbanks.

About the author

Kathy worked with the Bureau of Land Management for 12 years before founding Livestock for Landscapes in 2004. Her twelve years at the agency allowed her to pursue her goal of helping communities find ways to live profitably AND sustainably in their environment. She has been researching and working with livestock as a land management tool for over a decade. When she's not helping farmers, ranchers and land managers on-site, she writes articles, and books, and edits videos to help others turn their livestock into landscape managers.

1 Comment

This is a nice, concise explanation by Ben Bartlett of what holistically planned grazing is and it is a good follow up to Troy Bishop’s articles about winter stockpile grazing where he uses Holistic Management grazing charts. Thanks for making the loop with theory and practice. As Ben says, it is a “learned technique” and your coverage helps us in that learning. Thanks again.